tongue to the battery, speaking 8-bit
by Ivory Muse
Summary: "This relationship isn't competent driving. I can't give up on it so easily. And I'll have a long time to prove that." — Sheldon/Amy, after 8x24.


notes:_ i __knew__ i forgot s__omething in my paroxysm of feels, and i'd like to thank my anon for reminding me_— spoiler alert up to the season finale, so don't read if you haven't already read the taping report or at least heard the rumors online. _yeah, you know what, fuck this shit. we're getting a shamy happy ending even if i have to camp out in front of chuck lorre's house— and for now, enjoy my totally shameless, probably hella ooc continuation to that episode because SHELDON ENGAGEMENT RING GAAAAAAH. _

* * *

He only knocks once, ignoring the horrible twitch in his synapses that veritably _commands_ him to repeat the action. If he starts this as usual, it'll end as usual.

She'd wanted a break, afraid that they'd remain eternally stagnant; he gave it a couple of weeks, and he tried thinking about what she meant to him, what he stood to lose. It wasn't hard, because his whiteboards were covered with equations were covered with _her_. She's wormed her way inside his head, under his skin, taken up permanent residence— Sheldon Cooper, supposed island unto himself, has not been so for a very long time.

(He does not wish to be alone anymore, and the leaden weight in his coat pocket is obvious testament.)

The door creaks open to reveal Amy, wearing brightly colored pajamas, hair mussed and eyes wide— and that's when he remembers it's two in the morning. He'd been so energized by his sudden revelation_— I want to marry this girl_— that he just raced out of his apartment and caught the first bus he could find. Sans bus pants. The things he does for love.

"Amy, I've reached a conclusion," he announces without preamble, not allowing time to hesitate. His throat is very dry.

"Come inside, you're going to wake up the neighbors," she croaks— he does, and perches himself on the plaid couch where they had their first kiss. The apartment seems more claustrophobic than he's ever felt it to be, his frenzied nerves playing tricks. "Do you know what _time_ it is?"

"It couldn't wait." She doesn't look especially happy to see him, though he supposes that if his REM cycle had been interrupted like he's interrupted hers, he would be a good deal less cordial. "I think we've taken a long enough break."

She puts her hand up to her face. "Sheldon," she says, "I can't keep forcing you to be intimate, and I'm sick of going back and forth. Either you commit to a relationship, or we have to end this."

"Five years ago, I couldn't even hold hands without wanting to sanitize my entire body," he says, bristling in spite of himself. "Now I regularly engage in open-mouthed kissing. I've seriously considered coitus. How much more intimacy do you need?"

"I called you a flight risk once, and I can't say I was wrong," she shoots back. "Every time we've moved forward, I've practically had to demand it. Have you ever _wanted_ to kiss me, or is it just a contractual obligation to you? Some favor you give me and I shut up?"

He's so angry, both at her and at himself, that he's struck dumb for a moment— his father's temper, that old inheritance, flaring with a vengeance. How can she believe he's only been going through the motions when she's revolutionized every aspect of his orderly life? How could he be so awful at expressing himself, at showing any of his affection for her? "Well, little lady, maybe this will change your mind," he pronounces crossly, pulling out the velvet box and snapping open the top. "One and a half carats."

She says nothing at all for a long, agonizing second. Her face is a complete and utter blank. "Is it the wrong kind?" he asks, his brief burst of temper dissipating like morning fog. "There's a year-long return policy, I made sure to find out. If you want a different one—"

"You bought a ring?" she asks, so softly that he has to strain to hear her. "An... _engagement_ ring? You came here to _propose_?"

"I was waiting for the right moment," he replies hoarsely. There's a thundering, dizzying pulse beating against his chest, in his ears. This is much more important than even his doctoral defense ever was; he's crossed the Rubicon, no going back. "I know I don't like touching people, or overt romantic gestures, and I do a terrible job of showing it... but I love you. I _love_ you. There is nobody else I've wanted to spend the rest of my life with."

Her eyes— sea green, the color of the Gulf of Mexico in the summer— narrow a little. "If I accept, are you going to leave me at the altar? Run off on another cross-country train journey once you realize how much change this entails?"

It stings, such an attack right on the locus of his identity; avoid and evade. He is used to being the alpha— the one dancing around romance, weaponizing it. Pride goeth before a fall. How can he explain his desire, he, the robot man with an always rusty heart? "This relationship isn't competent driving. I can't give up on it so easily. And I'll have a long time to prove that."

Amy kisses him so hard in response that he almost stumbles; he moans in the back of his throat, atavistic, and cannot feel ashamed. Blindly, he loses himself in lips and teeth and tongue, his hands fumbling and hesitant against her waist— she is on the attack, her movements more steady, more practiced.

Then she pulls away and cups his face. It's as though she's sucked all of the air out of the room, left him breathless. "Ask properly."

For her, he'd do a lot of things. Even expose his pant knee to the germs and dust on her carpet. "Amy Farrah Fowler, will you make me happier than I was after discovering particle physics, Firefly, and Star Trek— put together— and marry me?"

"Yes," she says shakily, sliding the ring onto her finger. When he gets the courage to look up, there are tears on her cheeks.

"Why are you _crying_?" he demands. Women and their mood swings are going to be the death of him. "Did I do something wrong again? You said you wanted a romantic proposal!"

"I thought you would never be ready for commitment," she chokes out, "and you show up in the middle of the night with an engagement ring?" But she's smiling, too, and he realizes that he's smiling the same way; stupidly, uncontrollably, gleefully.

She agreed to _marry _him. She's going to be his _wife_. And, of course, he does the sensible thing in this situation and kisses her, inhaling the soft sweet smell of her hair and skin. He tries to fit a lot into that kiss, like I'm sorry and you are so terrifyingly beautiful and I have never had another human being so far inside my ribcage before, but mostly his mind is silent and peaceful and he feels as though his chest might burst from sheer joy.

"Do you want to spend the night?" she asks, after a time. Her lips are swollen. Because of _him_.

"I'm not ready for that yet," he says, swallowing hard. He loves her and he thinks that the day he says 'yes' will be sooner than later, but there is only so much change he can stand in one night. "I'm not—"

She reaches over and clasps his hand in hers; it feels so right, natural, that she would touch him like this without prompt. "We can just sleep. It's three in the morning— far past your bedtime, Dr. Cooper."

"I don't suppose—"

And, yes, she _is _pulling a set of his pajamas and a toothbrush out from underneath her couch cushion. Vixen.

* * *

.oOo.

Sleeping next to her was nice and did not frighten him as much as he thought it would. The system-jolts of strange bed and strange pillow and strange sheets were starkly offset by the sheer hedonistic novelty; he'd tried his typical Kolinahr, thought about bell numbers and Cauchy products and topological spaces in a futile attempt to distract himself... then abandoned it as a lost cause and curled up against her body, luxuriating in her warmth, her steady heartbeat.

The sun rose that morning. She pulled his shirt off over his head last night, touched the jagged xylophone of his ribs with her fingertips— and now he's sitting comfortably in her kitchen, eating pancakes, listening to her complain about her nicotine-addicted primates. Like any other day, except for the diamond on her left hand.

God, he's getting _married_.

"You're being quiet," Amy remarks, setting a glass of Yoo-Hoo down in front of him. "I know I've told you about Albert and his food-slinging tendencies before, but you could at least pretend to pay attention. I'm fairly certain that we have a clause in the Relationship Agreement on this topic, though I don't doubt that you drafted it for your own benefit."

"Do you have your copy of the Relationship Agreement?" he asks. "I'd like to see it."

She quirks an eyebrow, but runs into her bedroom and emerges a moment later, the agreement in hand. "Here," she says. "Section 17— what are you doing?"

It's a little harder than he anticipated— the Relationship Agreement is a very thick document, after all— but he manages to rip it in half with moderate effort. "There. No more contractual obligations, for either of us."

Her mouth is hanging wide open; honestly, she's going to attract flies, gaping like that. "Sheldon... this is anarchy. Total anarchy."

He shrugs, taking a sip of his Yoo-Hoo. "We're engaged now. It's not like the agreement had any applicable codicils."

"Are you sure you don't want it anymore?" she asks firmly. "One hundred percent? You're not going to spend our honeymoon drafting a Marriage Agreement?"

He thinks; really, he does, because that agreement has molded their lives for the past five years. About the kiss on the train and their disastrous turtle experiment and prom and the paper he couldn't write and the tiara he bought her and the sex roleplaying game, a tumultuous kaleidoscope. Sitting in the dark of the matinée, wondering how to come to terms with the so unfamiliar jealousy constricting his innards; Amy Farrah Fowler, will you be my girlfriend?

"We don't need it," he says, and he has never been more sure in his life. "I think we can kiss, cuddle, and apply vapor-rub to each other's torsos without the training wheels of defined edicts."

She wraps her arms around his neck, kisses the hollow behind his ear— something that blasted agreement strictly prohibited, something that now sends a welcome shiver down his veins. "I think so, too."


End file.
